Coulda, Shoulda, Woulda
by sweetdonalbain81507
Summary: A cheery tale in which everyone dies. A sort of backstory/prequel thing to my other fic "We Don't Say Goodbye". I would suggest reading that one first.


**Disclaimer: I own "We Don't Say Goodbye", which this is sort of kind of a backstory for, but I don't own RENT, which both this and "WDSG" are based on. Well obviously they're based off of RENT; they're in the RENT category on fanfiction (dot) net.**

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Surprisingly enough, Mimi was not the next one to die. She was not even the one after the next one to die. Oddly, it was Maureen who died next, in shape, HIV- Maureen. Even more ironically, Maureen died because of Mimi's almost death.

It had been a miracle, she said, that Mimi was restored to them, not something that could be counted upon. Supposedly, the only thing that anyone could count on during a medical emergency was calling an ambulance. Like the people who had put Collins on hold. Of course, that was to be expected; Mimi's life had no real importance. Why should anyone have cared, or come to help?

At least, she said that during her next performance. Her last performance. They were among her last words, actually. Apparently the police did not exactly appreciate the implication that they and their emergency brethren were selective in who they helped. Or maybe the protest really was getting too rowdy, who can tell? In any case, by the end, it was a riot, not a peaceful protest, whether or not it was because the police had shot into the air or in spite of it. Well, they had begun by shooting into the air. When the chaos had gotten to a huge height, some of those shots did not go into the air. One or two bullets had ended up shot into Maureen instead.

Accident? Possibly. Probably. Scandal? Definitely. Maureen Johnson was the name on the lips of just about everyone in the state for the next month or so. Her name became synonymous with police brutality. She even had a law named after her: the Maureen Act.

She would have hated the complete lack of creativity of that name. She would have loved all of the attention lavished on her death. She would have loved her manner of death, going out in a blaze of glory, helping to change the state as she did so. She would have, but she was dead, so she did not.

Collins was the next to go. He had always seemed like the strongest of all of them, definitely of all of them with HIV/AIDS. Everyone had supposed that he would be the last of them to succumb to the disease. Maybe he would have been; he had not waited to find out. His death was not in a hospital bed, hooked up to machines, slowly wasting away. His death was in his apartment with a note and a rope close by.

Everyone had sort of understood his reasons; he had, in the span of three months, lost the love of his life and his best friend. Shortly before the end, he had gotten bitter, realizing that there really was no hope. Nothing changes, nothing ever will. He and his friends...they had no chance. They were as good as dead anyway. They had all understood where he was coming from when he did it. Or maybe they had not understood, maybe it was only because of the note that he left. Maybe none of them had known them as well as they had thought. Who can say?

He would have been ashamed of himself, giving up and taking the coward's way out. He would have been glad that he remembered not to do it in any way involving blood, keeping Mark and Joanne from suffering the same as he when April had done it before him. He would have loved his casual memorial service, where no one wore black and everyone got drunk and his ashes were randomly scattered about, so that he was both nowhere and everywhere. He would have, but he was dead, so he did not.

It was Mimi's turn next, and this time there was no one to save her. Of course, she did have instant attention when Mark called her an ambulance. She had tuberculosis, which the hospital was not quite sure how to treat while keeping her on her AZT. They had hopes that they could figure it out in time...but they could not.

She got a lot of media attention by being "the girl Maureen Johnson was protesting for", and soon enough started getting some in her own right. This young woman was only 20 years old and was a drug addict, forced to work as a stripper, and was infected with HIV at the age of 17. She became the poster child for the struggling street girl, the teenage runaway, domestic violence. She got a refuge for prostitutes named after her, the Miriam House.

She would have hated the name of the house, a reminder of her real name which she hated so much. She would have liked the idea of helping girls in bad situations. She would have been irritated at the assumption that she was a prostitute because she danced in an S&M club. She would have, but she was dead, so she did not.

Another strange thing about Mimi's death was that it was the last one to be caused by the disease.

Roger was the fifth of seven to go. He had been reeling from all of the death among his friends; the three remaining of the group all were. They were unconsciously pulling apart from each other, not being the family they once had been. It was not uncommon for one of them to not contact the other two for weeks at a time, for the others to not even know where he or she was during that time. Roger held the record for the longest such disappearance: he went out on April 17 and never contacted the other two again. They did know where he was, though, down to the exact plot.

They were pretty sure that it was an accidental overdose. He had been so disgusted by April and Collins that neither one could imagine him joining them as the third suicide. Of course, he had been so disgusted by Mimi's continued addiction that it was hard for them to accept his overdose, accidental or otherwise.

He would have been ashamed of the hypocrisy of his actions. He would have been angry that Mark babied him so much and was still so hidden in his work that he did not even notice when he really needed him. He would have laughed at how many people that he had hated and had hated him back made speeches at his funeral about how terrible his death was, what a waste of a wonderful human being it was, and all the rest of their crappy clichés. He would have, but he was dead, so he did not.

Mark and Joanne got a three month break to mourn for their dead friends before it was Joanne's turn. She had gone for a walk one night, thinking about Maureen and how incredible it was that everyone seemed so sympathetic to her now that she was dead. As it turned out, not _every_one sympathized with the late performer. In fact, some rather hated her, not for her bitchiness, her outspokenness, or her flirtatiousness, but for her sexuality. In turn, some rather hated her girlfriend, who had been occasionally mentioned in some news reports, since Maureen was a kind of national celebrity. Some of those that hated the two were strangely obsessive and good at tracking people down when they went on walks.

Another sensation was caused by this second to last death. A young, successful, African-American, female lawyer was such an equal opportunities cliché coming true. When that young, successful, African-American, female lawyer was beaten to death for being a lesbian, she became a LGBT cliché coming true. She became an icon, the face of gay rights. She even posthumously helped establish violence based on sexual orientation as a hate crime.

She would have been embarrassed at all of the attention her death got. She would have been touched by how many of her homophobic colleagues rallied for her, claiming that they did not even know she was a lesbian until she was killed for it and that it had nothing to do with her character. She would have cried for Mark, left on his own. She would have, but she was dead, so she did not.

And so Mark's prophecy was fulfilled: he was the one to survive, or so he thought. In any case, his status did not last long. Fittingly, the quietest life ended with the quietest death. He was just one of a short list of names in the paper the day after a terrible accident on Avenue A.

No one paid attention to him, really. His family was the only ones at his funeral. Hardly anyone even noticed that he was gone, let alone mourned for him.

He would have been upset that his film did not get any attention. He would have regretted never having lived the way that his friends did, without regret. He would have faded away into nothing. He would have, but he was dead, so he did not.

And so the real one to survive cried alone, without quite knowing for whom he was crying.

Benny would have reconciled with them. He would have let them stay in the apartment, whatever he said. He would have helped them, if they had ever given him the chance. He would have, but they were dead, and maybe so was he.

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**A/N: I should be working on analyzing whether or not Macbeth and Banquo were in a homosexual relationship and how this would have affected Lady Macbeth for my scary play director. Instead, I wrote this. Please review.**


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